Abstract
AbstractThe new information and communications technologies are expanding human connectivity, reconfiguring urban spatialities and generating a kind of social space that spans real and virtual, personal and impersonal, private and public. As a result, the space and time boundaries become blurred, giving rise to novel needs for, and practices of, public space usage. However, the ways in which these new practices affect public space engagement and public life in general, remain yet unclear. In addition, variations might exist due to differences in local culture and conditions, or due to specific lifestyles and behaviours favouring isolation and privatism or, at best, interaction only with close friends and kin. The above issues become even more critical for young people, who born in a digital era are able to handle new technologies with utmost ease. This chapter sheds light on the related perceptions and practices of adolescents. Structured interviews were applied to eight teenagers living in Hannover (Germany), Lisbon (Portugal), Tel Aviv (Israel) and Volos (Greece) to gather focused, qualitative and textual data. It examines how young people of distinct sociocultural contexts perceive and use both public spaces and digital technologies. This enables to identify emergent logics, needs and patterns of socialization and public space engagement placing specific emphasis on the role information technologies can play in them.
Highlights
The term “adolescent” is used in this work to mean anyone between the age of 14 and 16 years, and is used interchangeably with other terms “teenager” and “young people”
This chapter comes to elucidate the aforementioned issues, examining the perceptions and practices of teenagers (14–16 years of age), using informal interviews structured in the form of a questionnaire with eight adolescents living in Hannover (Germany), Lisbon (Portugal), Tel Aviv (Israel) and Volos (Greece)
Young people are seemingly invisible in the urban landscape (Travlou et al 2008); they are excluded from the dominant “adult” public space through controls and rules, afforded only with “leftover” or “token” spaces (Matthews 1995; Childress 2004), which are usually not sufficient to their needs (Lieberg 1995)
Summary
The term “adolescent” is used in this work to mean anyone between the age of 14 and 16 years, and is used interchangeably with other terms “teenager” and “young people”. This chapter comes to elucidate the aforementioned issues, examining the perceptions and practices of teenagers (14–16 years of age), using informal interviews structured in the form of a questionnaire with eight adolescents living in Hannover (Germany), Lisbon (Portugal), Tel Aviv (Israel) and Volos (Greece) It examines how teenagers of different sociocultural contexts perceive and use public spaces and ICTs, in an attempt to identify emergent logics (and needs) of socialization and public space engagement. Young people are seemingly invisible in the urban landscape (Travlou et al 2008); they are excluded from the dominant “adult” public space through controls and rules, afforded only with “leftover” or “token” spaces (Matthews 1995; Childress 2004), which are usually not sufficient to their needs (Lieberg 1995) In their attempts to contest adults’ spatial domination and to declare their independence, adolescents develop their own “micro-geographies” in space (Matthews et al 1998). With a view to initiate such a forum where adolescents can articulate their needs, preferences, views, concerns, etc. regarding urban public spaces, the present exploratory study aims to introduce some aspects that stand out from the perspective of eight adolescents living in different sociocultural contexts of four distinct cities
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